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People’s Institutions

Dec 18, 2011 Editorial

 

We would hope that the new government – in whatever form it eventually settles into – will take a hard look at the breakdown of our societal institutions – not just the governmental ones being emphasised. We witness the deleterious effects everywhere, exemplified by drug and alcohol abuse, murders; various other crimes against fellow Guyanese – even among family members – and a general return to a pervasive “law of the jungle” morality.
Changes in human institutions are inevitable over time but must be achieved in a self conscious manner so as to ensure that we do not end up with practices that are totally at variance with our collective vision of the “good life”.
The traditional institutions of the family, the church and the school that are supposed to have socialised us into positive roles have evidently all been eroded. From the chaos that typifies our lives in the present, it would appear that, in the words of Gramsci, the old has died but the new is yet to be born.
Upon reflection, it might be more accurate to say that much of the old has been murdered in our drive towards “modernisation” in the post-colonial era. Driven by various (and competing) unadapted interpretations of various leftist “isms”, our leaders plunged our society into an orgy of change that were intended to literally create a “new Guyana man and woman”. It merely confirmed the old adage that “the road to hell is paved with good intentions”.
One lesson we can take from that experiment to create a new Utopia is that the ordinary people ought to be consulted when institutions that has worked for them in the past are sought to be jettisoned. “Modernisation” does not equal progress when the lives of the people are not improved. Another is that exhortation and slogans without commitment from the top is the surest way to generate cynicism about new institutions that are introduced putatively for the “people”.
One institution that was destroyed was ironically introduced in an earlier attempt to “modernise” the social base of a huge swathe of Guyanese society that had been extremely successful: the community centre of the sugar plantations from Demerara to Berbice. Introduced in tandem with the resettlement of the sugar workers from the logies that harked back to slavery and indentureship into massive new housing schemes, the community centres played an invaluable role in dampening incipient restlessness in the youths that sprouted from the baby boom that followed the resettlement.
The community centre all had a spacious building that housed facilities for a library, indoor games such as table tennis, a cafeteria that sold refreshments and a workshop for various crafts – all within a vast compound that contained a cricket field and sometimes even a football one. But as important as the physical infrastructure, was the human resource that was recruited to ensure that the goals of the venture were achieved. Each community centre had a full time “welfare officer” that directed the centre and actually had a home in the compound; so also did the groundsman.
Young men and women did not just learn to play games. Organised into clubs with the full complement of officers, they learnt the fundamentals of holding meetings, keeping records, executing plans etc from the community officers. The libraries opened a whole new world of ideas to the young just as scout groups did to the world of physical action.
More than any other institution, the community centres shepherded a whole people from the desolation of plantation life into the brave new world that beckoned. They helped to create viable communities. We note the efforts a few years ago of the previous administration to resuscitate the community centres. But as with many such initiatives, the drive seemed to have faltered.
Our newspaper had highlighted the folly of simply constructing buildings to deal with the anarchy overtaking our youths. Our authorities could do worse than examine the reason for the success of our old community centres.
Jock Campbell had a vision for people. Buildings alone do not, an institution make.

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